Filling in the Blanks
by Marcus S. Lazarus
Summary: What took place between "The Gallifrey Chronicles" and "Rose" that restored the Eighth Doctor's memory and caused him to regenerate? The Eighth Doctor's life ends as the Ninth's begins, and the consequences will change the past and define the future...
1. Aftermath

Disclaimer: I don't own the Doctor, the TARDIS, Fitz, Trix, K9, the Vore, Daleks, Madame Xing (From 'Halflife') or the Nestene Consciousness; they're all the BBC. I just own this plot.

Feedback: Please do

AN: If you haven't read the Dr Who books, here's a basic summary. Essentially, the Doctor's history was altered and his third incarnation regenerated ahead of schedule, causing him to be infected with a virus that would turn him into a member of Faction Paradox, a cult of time-travelling voodooist that worshiped time paradoxes, which was only cancelled out by the TARDIS holding the new and original timeline within itself. In a desperate last effort, the Doctor triggered the TARDIS to be deprived of all its energies, destroying Gallifrey AND Faction Paradox, before wiping his memories to store the contents of the Time Lord Matrix within his subconscious. He was eventually reminded of the accident by one of the few other surviving Time Lords at the end of 'The Gallifrey Chronicles' by Lance Parkin, but then had to deal with an invasion of Earth by the Vore (See below). When the novel ended, the Doctor had just dived into their mountain base with his companions, Fitz Krienier and Trix MacMillan, with a plan for stopping them…

Filling in the Blanks

Standing back from the mountain, the Doctor and his companions watched, the Doctor with a small smile on his face, as the Vore mountain began to collapse in on itself before vanishing into thin air.

"Wow…" Ftiz commented, from where he was standing on the Doctor's right, watching the mountain vanish. He stared curiously at the Doctor. "Could you just explain again exactly _how_ did you do that?"

"Oh, it was simple enough," the Doctor said casually, as though defeating a race of superintelligent bugs with a command of hyperspace systems was an everyday occurrence. "I just worked out that, like hummingbirds and bees flying through the air by creating a vibratory pattern by flapping their wings, the Vore's hyperspace tunnels could be activated by them by triggering a certain frequency. All I had to do once I got in there was figure out that frequency, trigger it using the sonic screwdriver, and then sent every single Vore remaining straight to-"

"Actually," Trix cut in, looking curiously at the Doctor at that last statement, "you never told us that part; where _did _you send them again?"

"The heart of the Sun," the Doctor said dismissively. "I wanted something large and nearby, and it fitted the bill exactly."

Here he smiled and looked back at Ftiz. "From there, it was easy; we just evacuated the mountain and I called General Lethbridge-Stewart and had him order a bombing raid on the mountain."

"And that's it?" Fitz asked, looking at his old friend.

Looking back at Fitz, the Doctor knew what his friend meant. He almost considered it ironic; ever since he'd woken up in that railway carriage in 1888, with no memories and only the small box that would grow to become the TARDIS in his pocket, he'd spent most of his remembered life waiting for Fitz; admittedly, he'd spent some time without him before, when Fitz had travelled to Siberia, but event hen, a part of him had known that Fitz would be back.

Now…

He nodded at Fitz, a nod of acceptance and resignation that confirmed his willingness to end their time together at last better than anything he could have said.

"That's it," he said, looking at his two old friends. They'd barely known each other a year- for him, that seemed such a short time, even without all his memories- and now, here they were, ready to leave him and the TARDIS and begin a new life, all of their own.

He looked at them both once again. "Are you sure you'll be all right?" he asked them, a slight note of concern in his voice. He knew that they could cope with the lives they'd chosen travelling with him, of course, but it wasn't the same as trying to live a permanent life on a single planet…

In reply, Fitz and Trix put their arms around each other's shoulders, and Trix smiled up at the Doctor.

"We'll be fine," she reassured him. Then a thought occurred to her, and she looked back at him. "But what about you? I mean, after… well, after all _that_…"

"Oh, don't worry about me," the Doctor smiled. Then he cocked his head to one side in an almost quizzical manner, as though hearing something off to one side…

"What?" Fitz asked, noting the change in the Doctor.

"Oh, nothing," the Doctor said, turning around and heading off behind a nearby tree. When he came out from behind it, he was being followed by…

Trix blinked in surprise.

"A robot dog?" she asked, looking up quizzically at the Doctor.

"Affirmative," the dog said, looking up at her with its single red eye, somehow managing to look smug without any actual expression on its face. "I am K-9."

"Oh," Fitz said, looking back up at the Doctor while Trix continued to stare down at K-9. "And K-9 is…?"

"Oh, many things," the Doctor replied, smiling. "An old friend of mine, something I whipped up in my spare time, a useful means of defence and finding information, but, more importantly, you may consider him my housewarming gift for the two of you."

Trix looked up in surprise.

"What!" she said, staring at the Doctor.

The Doctor shrugged. "Well, I can hardly keep a dog with my lifestyle, can I?" he asked, smiling pleasantly at them. "Besides, I'd like to ensure you have someone to keep an eye on you two, and K-9 seems like the best candidate for the job. Right, K-9?"

"Affirmative, Doctor-Master," K-9 said, nodding its head slightly at the Doctor. Then it looked back up at him, again somehow managing to appear curious despite its lack of any real features on its face. "Is what I have acquired satisfactory?"

"Oh yes," the Doctor said, nodding at K-9. "Trust me, it'll be fine."

"What?" Fitz asked, looking up at the Doctor. "What did he get you?"

"Oh, just a little something from an old friend," the Doctor replied casually. Then he turned around and began to walk back towards the forest where he'd moved the TARDIS; the three of them had been forced to evacuate the Vore mountain by a route that unfortunately didn't leave them particularly close to the TARDIS.

"Wait!" Fitz called after the Doctor, who turned around to look at his friends one last time.

"Yes?" he asked.

Fitz didn't reply. Instead, he walked up to the Doctor, and, solemnly, held out one hand.

The Doctor shook it, looking Fitz in the eyes as he did so.

"Thanks," Fitz said simply as he looked at his old friend. "For everything… Even the bits you don't remember. I… well, I wouldn't be who I am today if it wasn't for you"

The Doctor nodded in reply. "I'm glad I could help," he said. He looked back at Trix and K-9, and smiled slightly at Fitz. "Take care of them."

Fitz nodded. "Take care of yourself," he said.

The Doctor nodded back, and then he turned around and continued to walk towards the forest, heading back towards his TARDIS and out of their lives for good.

For a few seconds, Fitz watched his old friend's bottle-green-and-cream-clad form fade gradually away, his longish brown hair blowing slightly around his head in the wind. Then he sighed, smiled, and turned back to Trix and K-9.

Now all they had to do was wait for a plane to pick them up after checking the mountain for Vore survivors- that UNIT group had mentioned they'd send someone along to pick them up after hearing about the Doctor's presence, and there was still Rachel to recover, even without them-, and they were set.

Their time with the Doctor was over.

Now it was time to start living the life the Doctor never could, and wish their old friend luck in returning to the life he'd once had and regaining the memories he'd once possessed.

* * *

Stepping back into the TARDIS, the Doctor closed the door behind him and studied the surrounding console room. He'd grown attached to the old thing over the years, but he had to admit that this new design it was creating after that cold fusion explosion had its positive sides as well; larger, smoother lines and remaining equally spacious, with large winding pillars that almost resembled the smooth bones of living creatures around its edges. The metal grating that acted as the floor managed to compliment the almost organic surroundings rather than clash with them, and the control console in the centre, with the Time Rotor sticking out of it, continued to make him feel better every time he saw it.

Reaching out with one had, he stroked the glass softly, smiling as he did so.

"We've had some times, haven't we, old thing?" he said to it. Then he looked up at the ceiling. "Didn't we have another of you in here somewhere? I need some storage space for… things"

In answer, a long stream of lights lit up along one wall, running along towards the door that led deeper into the TARDIS. Curious, the Doctor went through the door and followed the illuminated roundels in the wall, until, finally, he arrived in a smaller room, white, with a six-sided central control console.

Reaching out, the Doctor patted it affectionately.

"Hello there," he said casually, not caring that it might be taken as an odd thing to do by anyone else. "It's been a long time, hasn't it?"

The TARDIS console didn't reply vocally, but a brief blinking of lights seemed to indicate it was glad to see him again.

The Doctor stood there for a few seconds. Then he reached into his pocket and pulled out a fairly large black box-like device with two handprints in one side. He placed it on the TARDIS console, near two circular objects, and then placed his hands upon it.

This box was what K-9 had collected for him; a modified viroid from the planet Espero, developed by a mysterious woman called Madam Xing. Under normal conditions, the viroid allowed the user to regain memories that may have been lost due to some accident or trauma, but, on the Doctor's request, this version had been modified to serve another purpose.

Namely, to boost the circuitry of this TARDIS console to allow him to store the contents of the Matrix within the TARDIS.

It wasn't much of an option, he'd admit, but, now that he knew what it was he'd done, the Doctor found himself wanting to know the rest of the fine details about his past. His family, his old friends, his old enemies…

Everything.

And the only way he'd ever learn that was if he gave the Matrix a new home to protect it when he restored his old memories.

Reaching down, he grasped the viroid with both hands, and focused inward, searching for the contents of the Matrix in his mind, underneath all his new memories formed since the accident.

He touched them. All the memories of every single dead Time Lord that ever was, all kept in his head, waiting for this moment…

For a brief moment, there was nothing.

Then, the Doctor opened his eyes, and the faint voices were gone.

He was alone in his head once more; even when he hadn't _known _about them, there'd still been a nagging 'presence' in the back of his mind, but now that was gone, leaving his inner head silent once again.

He looked at the console for a few seconds. Then he reached into his pocket and pulled out another, more conventional viroid.

He looked at it, and sighed briefly, expelling the last of his doubts as he looked resolutely at the object in his hands.

The time had come.


	2. Filling the Hole in History

Disclaimer: I don't own the Doctor, the TARDIS, Fitz, Trix, K9, the Vore, Daleks, Madame Xing (From 'Halflife') or the Nestene Consciousness; they're all the BBC. I just own this plot.

Feedback: Please do

AN: Anything in italics is an extract from 'The Ancestor Cell' by Peter Anghelides and Stephen Cole, while anything in bold is original

Filling in the Blanks

The Doctor raised the viroid to his head, triggered its activation…

And, suddenly, his head was awash with memories.

Visions of his childhood, his father watching a meteor storm with him as they on the grass on a warm Gallifreyian night…

He was on Gallifrey, dressed in the robes of the Prydonians, arguing with his fellow council members…

He was fleeing Gallifrey in his old Type 40 TARDIS, wired into the Hand of Omega as he tore through the transduction barriers into the past…

He was travelling across Marius with his granddaughter Susan and his companions Ian and Barbara, seeking keys to control a machine he didn't approve of…

He was confronting the Cybermen in their ice tombs of Telos, along with the young Jacobite Jamie MacCrimmon and Victorian girl Victorian Waterfield, terrified at the thought of their escape even as he fought to stop them…

He was exiled to 1970s Earth, working with Jo Grant, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, and UNIT as a whole, as he tried constantly to repair the TARDIS amid what sometimes seemed like a never-ending assault of alien invasions or other forms of crisis…

He was in Skaro's distant past with Harry Sullivan and Sarah Jane Smith, facing Davros, creator of the Daleks, trying to reason with a maniac as his old foes began their spread across creation...

He was in the underwater base with Turlough and Tegan Jovanka, doing everything he could to convince Ichtar the Silurian not to trigger nuclear war on Earth…

He was on trial for his life with Mel Bush and Sabalom Glitz, staring in horror at the Valeyard, now identified as his own dark future self…

He was on the distant planet Ry'leh, accompanied by Ace and Benny Summerfield, along with the extra additions of Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson as they sought Holmes' insane elder brother…

He was…

Here.

The Doctor collapsed forward, grasping the console with his hands to steady himself.

He thought back over all his new memories, and smiled; everything seemed to be there. No holes, no unusual gaps, no faces he didn't remember meeting for the first time (Even if the timelines got a bit crossed on occasion; that encounter with Harry at least made more sense now, he'd have to go back and explain things to him when he had the chance)…

The Doctor frowned.

Wait a minute…

Something wasn't right with his last restored memories.

He closed his eyes, and thought back to those events that had led to his previous, memory-less condition…

* * *

"_We are-"_

"_You are Faction Paradox," spat the Doctor, looking back angrily at the man dressed in what was almost certainly solid bone. "Yes, I know. That much is patently obvious."_

* * *

"**YOU ARE THE DOCTOR! YOU ARE THE ENEMY OF THE DALEKS!"**

"**Oh dear…" the Doctor muttered to himself, looking at the sight in front of him; a Dalek, as deadly and armed as ever, hovering towards him, its gun outstretched. He tensed himself, ready to dive out of harm's way…**

_

* * *

_

The Doctor stared at the Time Lord agent, Mali, affronted. "You stupid woman!" he yelled. "You're completely missing the point! I'm not a Faction agent!"

_Mali stared down at him, unmoved. "Your biodata is riddled with their virus."_

"_No!" The Doctor shook his head, and felt the knife scrape against his chin. "It only probably is!"_

* * *

"**Mali, you're missing the point!" the Doctor cried, as he stared at the gun in her hand. "I'm not a Dalek spy!"**

**Mali stared down at him, unmoved. "Their biomolecular nanobots have overridden your own Time Lord nanobots."**

"**No!" the Doctor yelled. "They only **_**probably **_**have!"**

* * *

"_Don't you see? The Faction altered my timeline, killed me before my time, thought they'd poisoned my body along with my history. But when I finally did regenerate, inside the console room, the TARDIS knew something was wrong."_

* * *

"**Don't you see? The Daleks not only killed me, they unknowingly altered history, killing me **_**before my time**_**, infecting me with their experimental nanobots in the hope the nanobots would kill my mind and make me their puppet. But when I finally **_**did **_**regenerate, inside the console room, the TARDIS knew something was wrong."**

* * *

The Doctor nodded thankfully in understanding. At least _some _things were constant; despite the changes, in both cases, the TARDIS was desperately seeking to ensure history remained unaltered, holding both the original and new timelines within itself to preserve his identity even at the cost of his own. Amid all the chaos that his memories seemed to have suddenly become, a constant factor was a welcome change.

_But what's _causing _these changes?_ The Doctor asked himself, as he simultaneously remembered Greyjan revealing that the enemy would be the ancestor cells mutated by the energies of I.M. Foreman's pocket universe and Mali discovering that the Daleks had used the actions of the ancestor cells as inspiration for their new ability to absorb arton energy to repair themselves and launch an attack on Gallifrey. _Why do I remember _both_ of these alternatives as having occurred _at once...?

* * *

"_My life ends as it began," the Doctor whispered, his face twisted between fascination and disgust at the sight of himself looking out from the podium onto the Shadow Parliament. "Congratulations, Doctor. You're a grandfather again."_

* * *

"**I should have known he'd be here," the Doctor whispered, his face twisted between rage and fear at the sight of Davros, the father of the Daleks himself, actually moving about on Gallifreyian soil. "Congratulations, Doctor. You and they have come full circle."**

* * *

As more memories returned, the Doctor couldn't help but shudder.

In many ways, the Dalek invasion he was now remembering was worse than the Faction's assault; the Faction might have been aided by future information, but they were still limited in how they could attack Gallifrey on the surface.

But the Daleks… attacking from outside Gallifrey in a ruthless assault… claiming the Cruciform that the Time Lords had established on a distant planet as their first line of the defence in the first few minutes of the assault…

It was a terrifying sight to behold.

But what was _causing _these memories…?

* * *

"_Why are you not ours?" Grandfather Paradox- the Doctor's possible future self, the god of Faction Paradox- asked, staring at his past self with the dispassionate interest of a surgeon at an autopsy. "Your body was riddled with the Faction virus- I sensed it in the Council chamber."_

"_You sensed it because you are attuned to the infected time line trying to imprint itself over the original," the Doctor shouted up at the distorted image._

_Grandfather Paradox scowled. "You're lying!"_

"_He's not, you know," a third voice said. The ghostly, dust-formed image of the Third Doctor- the Doctor that should have been before all the Faction's interference happened- stood, hands on hips, in the centre of the console room._

* * *

"**Why have you not realised the truth?" Davros asked, staring at the Doctor as he lowered himself down to the ground, facing his old nemesis. "Your body is riddled with the Dalek poison; I have seen its effects!"**

"**You saw it because you are more ingrained in the infected time line rather than the original it is trying to imprint itself over," the Doctor shouted up at the distorted image.**

**Davros scowled. "You're lying!"**

"**He's not, you know," a third voice said. The dust image of the Third Doctor's temporal ghost stood, hands on hips, in the centre of the console room.**

* * *

"_Just one bolt fired will drain off all the energy holding the Edifice together," the Doctor yelled. "The internal dimensions will collapse down to something the size of this stabiliser."_

_The Grandfather stared back at him. "Gallifrey, Kasterbourus… This entire sector of space will be destroyed, torn apart."_

_The Doctor nodded, eyes welling with tears. "Forever," he said firmly. "But your entire fleet will perish too."_

"_You'll die too."_

"_Just as well, I think," the Doctor said, gritting his teeth. "I'd never be able to live with the memory anyway."_

* * *

"**Just one bolt fired will drain off all the energy holding the Edifice together," the Doctor yelled. "The internal dimensions will collapse down to something the size of this stabiliser."**

**Davros stared back at him. "You shall destroy all of Kasterbourus with the release of that much energy!"**

**The Doctor nodded, eyes welling with tears. "Forever," he said firmly. "But your entire fleet will perish too."**

"**You shall die too!"**

"**Just as well, I think," the Doctor said, gritting his teeth. "I'd never be able to live with myself for letting you get this far."**

* * *

The Doctor simply lay on the floor, staring up at the ceiling in horror as memories flooded through him.

Now he knew _why_ he had triggered the destruction of Gallifrey that Marnal had revealed to him; right then, at that moment, he, the TARDIS, and even the universe, were all stuck between two possibilities, and he'd needed to leave the TARDIS, and the universe as a whole, with only one true possibility in order to have any hope of saving _anything_.

It was either that, or watch creation be conquered, assuming it hadn't torn itself apart because of what had happened.

But then… what was this second history with Davros all about?

_

* * *

_

The Doctor pushed the button.

_The Grandfather screamed, apparently with the scream of the millions still caught on Gallifrey. The Doctor hung on to the vibrating bulk of the ancient console, and pressed his head against the hard bone surface as if for comfort._

_The Grandfather howled his despair to the universe…_

_As Gallifrey, Kasterbourus, and the entire Faction fleet vanished from existence forever._

_The Doctor had spent his life moving on from place to place, trying to keep the pages turning, never to reach the end of the story. Finally, there was nowhere to run._

_Why could he hear footsteps?_

**

* * *

**

As the Doctor pushed the button, he lashed out with one final, desperate punch at Davros's face, throwing the Dalek's creator back towards the Edifice's door.

**As he lay sprawled against the door, Davros screamed, apparently with the scream of the millions of Daleks and Time Lords still caught around Gallifrey, vocalising it for both them and the Doctor, as the Time Lord in question hung on to the vibrating bulk of the ancient console, pressing his head against the hard bone surface as if for comfort.**

**Davros screamed his rage out to the universe…**

**As Gallifrey, Kasterbourus, and the entire Dalek fleet vanished from existence forever; the Doctor caught a vague glimpse of Davros's command ship tumbling into the Gates of Elysium, a distant part of Kasterborous long forgotten and ignored.**

**Dazedly, the Doctor looked up at Davros, watching as the Dalek's creator tethered on the edge of the Edifice's doors, the dimensional instability finally winning, tearing him out of the Edifice even as he fought to activate what looked like an emergency teleport system.**

"**DOCTOOOOOOOoooorrrrrrrr…" he screamed, as he vanished into the Time Vortex.**

**The Doctor smiled slightly as he watched the Edifice seal up again. Whatever else had gone wrong in his life, he could be assured of one thing; the sacrifice of the Time Lords was not in vain.**

**The Daleks were gone… their foul taint eradicated from the entire universe for good at last…**

**Why could he hear footsteps?**

* * *

The Doctor shook his head; he didn't need to reflect on what had happened then. He already knew how things had turned out from there; those footsteps was Compassion, giving him the chance to save the knowledge of the Time Lords one last time.

He shook his head, trying to clear everything out. He couldn't be sure, but he was already starting to see how everything added together.

If Grandfather Paradox- the god, almost the _creator_ of Faction Paradox- had ceased to exist when the Doctor annihilated the timeline that led to his creation, than, logically, the Faction itself would have ceased to exist. After all, how could they exist if their creator had never even come about? Even they couldn't paradox their way out of something like _that_.

As a result, history had done the only thing it could do to cope with the 'wound' he'd so nearly caused Time; 'replace' the Faction in the battle with the only beings capable of matching them.

The Daleks.

Therefore, in this new history, it had been the Daleks who'd sought the Thirteenth Doctor's body; the ship claimed by the Krotons had been merely another Dalek scout ship that arrived independently of the main Dalek force.

It had been the Daleks who'd tried to distract the Doctor by creating a 'perfect' companion for him by tricking him into manipulating his own timeline.

It had been the Daleks who'd tried to destroy San Francisco via manipulation of a tear in reality.

It had been the Daleks who had tried to access the Cold, using the Remote- modified, 'upgraded' Robomen, created via the same memory-manipulated biomass method used by the Factions remote, creating beings essentially bred to be servants and programmed to act as Dalek emissaries on occasions where a more subtle approach was called for- to try and gain access to a TARDIS.

It had been the Daleks who'd sought control of I. M. Foreman's travelling show during the confrontation on Dust (Even if the Remote had been their 'emissaries' once again).

And…

The Doctor sighed.

It had been the Daleks who'd infected his third self, killing him ahead of schedule while infecting him with a robotic nanovirus that they'd hoped would kill him before he could destroy Skaro, or, failing that, turn him into a more advanced version of the next generation of Roboman, granting the Daleks access to time-travelling capabilities far beyond what they now possessed.

They'd nearly torn reality apart, just to get at him…

The Doctor sighed again, rubbing the bridge of his nose with his hands.

Even as he sat on the edge of the TARDIS console, staring blankly ahead of him, he could feel history reset itself in his head, the Dalek timeline overlaying the Faction one. So many slight changes here… Compassion wasn't a Faction agent… Fitz was slightly stronger and his mind more efficient after he was 'cloned' into Kode …

Suddenly, the Doctor froze.

Another new detail was just occurring to him.


	3. The Death of the Eighth Doctor

Disclaimer: I don't own the Doctor, the TARDIS, Fitz, Trix, K9, the Vore, Daleks, Madame Xing (From 'Halflife') or the Nestene Consciousness; they're all the BBC. I just own this plot.

Feedback: Please do

Filling in the Blanks

Leaping off the console, the Doctor turned around to face the controls, tapping desperately at the various buttons and levers in front of him, before turning around to look at the viewscreen behind him.

As he watched, a vast planet appeared on the screen, briefly dominating it before it shrunk down to a scale that allowed the Doctor to see what was going on behind it.

If he'd been more emotional, he would have sworn.

The Dalek war ships and the Time Lord's WarTARDISes, firing away at each other, driven to the furthest reaches of Kasterbourus as the Time Lords tried to force the Daleks away from Gallifrey…

The Doctor ignored those, however; he could change nothing there without altering history to an unpredictable degree, the possibilities made all the more serious by the presence of his past self so close to his current location.

He couldn't change the outcome of the Time War in any way; the new history was already creating time-locks on this conflict to prevent the two time-active combatants from changing history and constantly altering the outcome of any battle they might win or lose.

Right now, the only thing the Doctor could even _hope _to save the planet caught in the middle of this fight.

It was, so far, managing to avoid getting seriously damaged by the battlefire, but the Doctor knew that couldn't last with two such powerful combatants exchanging weapons' blasts; sooner or later, a shot would go wild, and that planet would be annihilated.

The Doctor had never been to the planet, but he knew its inhabitants well; he'd encountered its inhabitants at least four times in his travels. Twice in his third incarnation and twice in his sixth, he'd found himself locked in a desperate struggle with the native of that planet.

The Nestene Consciousness, a being composed entirely of sentient plastic.

He swallowed.

That would _not _be good.

He didn't know precisely what the Consciousness would do without its native planet, but he could make a few guesses, and none of them were promising. From what he now remembered of the Nestenes- after encountering them on five occasions in three different lifetimes, certain things were bound to stick more than others, they required certain chemicals in the atmosphere of the planet they were on to survive on a long-term basic, and right now, at this point in time and space, there was only one planet within range that fulfilled the necessary requirements.

Earth.

The Doctor quickly raced over his options. He could always try and stop the Nestenes once they got to Earth, but, given the choice, he'd rather not risk it; it would be far easier to try and stop them even having to _go_ to Earth in the first place.

Then he smiled, as an old memory returned to him.

_The Silurian Earth trick…_ he smiled to himself.

Of course, it was risky; the old girl may not take kindly to having this forced upon her after she'd had to take on the whole of Time Lord society at the same time- particularly not when some parts of her were still trying to reconstruct themselves after containing Marnal's cold fusion reactor-, and, of course, the Web of Time might try to stop him anyway…

But, given the somewhat malleable nature of the universe at that point, the Doctor was fairly confident that he could manage.

Quite frankly, with the unstable way things were at the moment as history restructured itself, what was one final little tweek for the better?

Reaching over, the Doctor triggered the TARDIS dematerialisation sequences, already falling comfortably back into the old patterns that his amnesia had blocked from him.

He smiled at the thought.

He may lack for a companion… He may lack for a home… He may even suffer from a slight uncertainty about what _exactly _had caused this whole situation he was now dealing with in the first place (Was it the Daleks or the Faction now; the memories were starting to run together…?)…

But he was the Doctor-_the _Doctor- once again.

Right now, that was all he needed to be as far as he was concerned.

He pushed the materialisation control, his fingers crossed.

_Please let this work…_ he thought, offering it up as a prayer to whoever was listening to him.

If he'd timed everything correctly, then the TARDIS would materialise around the Nestene homeworld, shielding it from the worst of the Dalek and Time Lord firepower and taking the damage onto its own nigh-on indestructible shell. Therefore, all the Doctor would have to do would be to wait out the fight in the TARDIS, make sure the Consciousness didn't infiltrate any part of his ship, and then

The familiar wheezing, groaning sound of materialisation filled the room, and the Doctor sighed with relief.

It all seemed to be going well…

Then the TARDIS shuddered violently under his fingers, nearly throwing him off his feet.

Staggering back up to stand beside the console, the Doctor quickly checked the instruments. On the one hand, his idea had worked; the TARDIS had materialised around the Nestene home planet, which was now protected from any outside damage that the Dalek saucers and the WarTARDISes might have caused it while leaving the TARDIS itself virtually unnoticeable by the warring ships (At this size the chameleon circuit- even one as badly damaged as this one- automatically altered to resemble the planet they surrounded as part of its overwhelming 'camouflage matrix'; at its normal size this feature was too weak to funcion).

On the other hand, the TARDIS was proving incapable of handling the strain that the Doctor was now forcing upon it; as when the Doctor had attempted this to save the Silurian Earth in his last incarnation, if he didn't dematerialise soon, the tremors caused by the strain to the TARDIS could shake the ship apart…

"NO!" the Doctor cried, slamming his fist down on the console. "Come on, old thing; we can do this! We _have _to-"

And then a console exploded in his face.

The Doctor screamed in agony as chunks of metal, wood, and the other elements that made up the console struck him in the face and chest, throwing him off his feet as the TARDIS rocked violently once again.

The Doctor tried to cope with the pain, but it was impossible; even if the pounding that the TARDIS was taking all because of his desperate bid wasn't enough on its own, the pain the TARDIS was feeling was being transferred into his own head due to his psychic link with his ship.

If he didn't dematerialise now, than not only would the Nestene homeworld die…

He would die.

His TARDIS would die.

And then what would happen to Earth?

Gritting his teeth, trying to fight back the pain that was shooting through his body- he wasn't even sure if his left eye was there anymore; it felt like something had struck it-, the Doctor staggered up to his feet, staggering over towards the nearest intact console, desperately reaching out for the dematerialisation control as the TARDIS shuddered, screaming in his mind as the battle's crossfire struck her shell again and again…

His hand slammed down on the necessary lever, and the familiar sounds of dematerialisation filled the room.

He smiled; at least that worry wasn't there anymore.

Then the smile fell as pain began to tear through his body, accompanied by the now-remembered feeling of a biological implosion on the cellular level…

It was just as the Doctor had suspected would happen when the first explosion occurred.

The damage had been too great.

He was regenerating.

The Doctor smiled slightly. He couldn't really complain, after all; this incarnation had been his longest to date, as far as he could remember, despite such close calls as that tumble over the cliff when he fought against the reborn Morbius, his temporary possession by the forces of anti-time, or even his final fight against the Council of Eight.

It may have been riddled by all kinds of complications- at least four different counts of amnesia of various lengths and exiles to both an alternate universe and the entire twentieth century of Earth, among other things- but, in the end, the Doctor could safely say that his eighth incarnation had been a good life.

But, as he'd once said- or had someone else said it; he really couldn't remember any more?-, all good things must come to an end.

He looked around the TARDIS.

This time, like for his second regeneration, she would be the only witness to his end…

And, in a way, he wouldn't have it any other way; after everything that Fitz had been through with him, he deserved to remember the Doctor as he'd been, rather than actually witness the life of his old friend finally cease.

"Goodbye, old girl," he said to the ship weakly, reaching up to lightly pat the console.

As his eyes began to blur, he stared at the damaged console, and sighed.

"I'm sorry…" he began to say, his strength rapidly fading even as he spoke, trying to convey his regret to his old friend for causing her so much pain over this incarnation…

And then his eyes were surrounded by a brilliant glow, energy tore through his body, and the Eighth Doctor effectively ceased to exist.


	4. A New Age Dawns

Disclaimer: I don't own the Doctor, the TARDIS, Fitz, Trix, K9, the Vore, Daleks, Madame Xing (From 'Halflife') or the Nestene Consciousness; they're all the BBC. I just own this plot.

Feedback: Please do

Filling in the Blanks

The Doctor blinked his eyes open.

The first thing he saw was the TARDIS console seemed to have repaired itself.

The second thing was that his hand seemed a lot rougher than it had been in his last body.

The third thing was that he had a new body.

"Oh…" he said, standing up and staring at his new hands. "I made it, then."

Then he shrugged, and looked around at the TARDIS. "Still, could have been worse, couldn't it?" he said to the ship.

Then he turned around and headed off for the wardrobe room. He wasn't sure what he wanted to wear in this life, but he was sure that it wasn't his current garb; even if his current clothing hadn't been damaged in the explosion that had caused him to regenerate, he'd instinctively disproved of the velvet he was dressed in at present. He still couldn't quite remember what had happened to him to cause this change, but give him a few moments and he was sure he'd be back to normal.

He entered the wardrobe…

And sighed at the sight; Marnal's cold fusion reactor had practically decimated the place. Most of the clothes were fairly safe- the TARDIS must have managed to contain the worst of the damage away from this area- but at least half the clothes were cinders, and there were no mirrors for him to examine his new face.

"Ah well," he said to himself, dismissing the issue of his appearance, "it doesn't matter that much; just go for something simple."

Then a thought occurred to him.

He actually had an _accent_; now that he thought about it, it sounded vaguely Northern.

"Mmm," he mused to himself, as he headed over to a nearby set of hangers and began to browse them for a costume. His hands hovered over his fifth self's red-and-cream coat, and then briefly contemplated a rather comfortable-looking tartan-coloured jumper, but eventually his hand settled on a fine-looking leather jacket, dark trousers, and a jumper in a deep red colour to wear underneath the jacket.

Pulling them off the rack, he smiled, laid them down on the ground, and began to take off the remains of his previous self's coat…

* * *

A few minutes later, the Doctor was standing in the remodelled console room, idly straightening out his jacket sleeves as he checked over the ship. He'd already examined his new appearance as well as he could without a mirror, and as far as he could tell his new clothes looked effective enough- the jacket even contained the psychic paper Serena had given him during that trip to Napoleon's ball in one pocket; he'd lost track of it after his regeneration and exile-, and he'd swiftly discovered an upgraded sonic screwdriver in another part of the wardrobe room- it almost looked like the TARDIS had provided him with this new one to replace the one he'd lost when it had exploded in his face; he could already tell this one had several new features available to it that the old one hadn't had, he'd need to make sure to spend some time working out what it was capable of-, leaving him with only the condition of the TARDIS itself to examine.

He still needed to look in a mirror at some point to get the full picture, of course; his new short hair just felt strange after spending so long with at least a couple of inches in all his previous incarnations, and there was no way of knowing how he looked with this whopping great big new nose in the middle of his face ('Whopping great big'? He _had _changed), but right now the TARDIS was more important; everything else could wait.

He was relieved to see that the console that- if his memory was accurate; regeneration always played havoc with his recall, even if this one appeared to have come through with a relatively minimal amount of disorientation- had exploded in his face, causing this last regeneration, appeared to have repaired itself while he was out of it; even if it couldn't repair most of the personal possessions that had been lost in the recent explosion, the TARDIS could do wonders for itself.

_Now, what was I doing earlier…_ The Doctor asked himself as he stared around the console. He knew he'd remember it eventually- something important enough for him to give his life wouldn't just be forgotten even _with _a regeneration like that- but the question was, would it be in time…?

And then it hit him.

The Nestene home planet.

He'd failed to save it from destruction, and now the Nestenes would be heading for twentieth-century Earth.

"Oh no…" the Doctor said to himself, as he headed for the console and began to set course for Earth.

He'd already lost his home planet millennia before its time should have come; he _wouldn't _lose the Earth as well…

At that thought, the Doctor stopped what he was doing, grasping the edges of the console as he stared vacantly into space. He didn't even need to continue on the console anyway- the coordinates for the new destination had all been entered-, but now…

Right now, he needed the comfort and support of his oldest and most devoted companion as he processed the full scale of what he had just realised for the first time in his new incarnation.

"It's gone…" he said, half to himself, the sudden sheer emptiness expressed by the word echoing in his mind. "They're all gone… Susan… Romana… Leela… Drax… Damon… Braxtiel…"

He sighed and bowed his head. "All gone…"

He watched as a single tear dripped onto the surface of the console, and closed his eyes; he couldn't afford to cry yet.

He was the Doctor.

Terrible loss or not, he had a job to do right now.

He had to save the planet which had been his prison for the last hundred years…

The Doctor briefly shuddered at the memory.

_God_, that exile had been _depressing_; at least the first time he'd been stuck on Earth he'd _known _what to do to get out of that mess, even if he hadn't been able to accomplish it at the time, but now-

He stopped himself; getting bogged down in blame and frustration wouldn't help Earth survive the coming events.

He was the Doctor; it was time to start _acting _like the Doctor.

* * *

An hour or so later, the Doctor found himself staring at the scanner, as the TARDIS tried to detect the distinctive trace of the Nestenes' sentient plastics on Earth.

_Damnit!_ the Doctor thought to himself, as he slammed his fist onto the TARDIS console. _How long does it take to find something that distinctive?_ _Come on, old girl come _on…

And then there was a beep.

"Yes!" the Doctor cried out, punching the air in victory as he stared at the screen; the Nestene consciousness had been detected. Reaching over, he tapped at a few buttons on the console, and watched as the monitor zoomed in on the source of the signal; what appeared to be a department store somewhere in London was currently the source of a high concentration of Autons.

_Fantastic!_ The Doctor thought to himself (Actually, that word sounded rather good; he'd have to be sure to use that more often this time around…).

According to the chronometer, it was night there, so he should manage to investigate the Nestene signal before things got out of hand; if he could find the relay device in time, he could probably whip up something suitable to blow that relay device sky-high before it could even get started.

Smiling, he set the TARDIS to dematerialise in an alleyway just opposite the front of the shopping centre; that way, if something went wrong, he stood a better chance of being able to evade the Autons that would be in the shop if he was just trying to get _out _of the building rather than just get to another part of it.

* * *

The Doctor sighed as he looked around himself at the corridors of the department store he'd found himself in.

Nothing.

He'd been searching around this place for the last few minutes, explosive device all ready to blow the Nestene relay device to pieces, and so far he'd found _nothing _that would indicate there was so much as a single Auton here, _and_ he was getting bored on top of everything else; evidently his new incarnation's attention span wasn't particularly long (Although that could just be post-regenerative disorientation; he'd need to give his new persona some time and take it from there).

He glanced down at the sonic screwdriver, moving it closer to his eye for inspection just in case he'd mislaid the power source; after all, he had only recently started using this thing, it wouldn't be impossible to assume he'd missed something…

Suddenly, he nearly stumbled as he walked into something. Looking down at his feet, he sighed as he saw the sight; a dead man, apparently in his mid-thirties, with at least- the Doctor winced- half his head missing, possibly from an Auton gun striking him in the face.

The Doctor stared at the body for a few seconds, and sighed.

_The first casualty of the new Auton invasion… _he mused regretfully.

He was briefly tempted to call UNIT- they'd certainly been helpful the first couple of times he'd faced the Nestenes-, but pushed that thought aside; right now, the memory of the war still fresh in his mind, just the thought of becoming associated with the military in this incarnation was something that he did _not _feel… comfortable… with-

Before he could follow that train of thought any further, the screwdriver started to beep. Looking down at it, the Doctor stood up and slowly turned around, stopping when the screwdriver was making an almost continuous whine while pointing at a door a few metres down the corridor, indicating the presence of a strong concentration of Nestene-controlled plastic in that direction.

Slipping the screwdriver off and into his pocket, the Doctor walked down towards the door, and, peering through the keyhole, saw what was causing the beeping; a vast, almost army-sized amount of Autons, walking towards a young blonde-haired woman with her back to the door…

The Doctor didn't hesitate.

A life was in danger, and he was the Doctor; the course of events was obvious.

He opened the door, grabbed her hand, and looked her in the eyes as she turned to see what had just grabbed her.

"Run!" he told her.

_**The rest… is history…**_


End file.
